Hey Check This Out 12/11

 https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/11/republicans-discover-dangers-selling-bunk-their-constituents/617197/

This article from The Atlantic draws the parallels between the lead up to, and the aftermath of the 1860 and the 2020 US presidential elections.  The divisions between modern day Americans and the two political parties are similarly as divided as back in the 1850’s leading up to the election of 1860 in which Abraham Lincoln (a Republican) was elected, much to the outrage of the US South; As described in the article the fiery speeches in the US Congress and toxic political rhetoric and conspiracy theories that were prevalent in the lead up to the 1860 election, which can also be said about the harsh divisions in the current 2020 political climate. In some ways, electing Obama president in 2008 helped improve race relations on some levels, or at least it opened up more dialogue about several important topics that had been ignored or downplayed for too long; issues like our country’s history and ongoing racial disparity, racial injustice, systemic racism as well as our country’s 250 disgraceful years of government sanctioned slavery.  In the eight years after Obama was elected, it also created anger and baseless conspiracy theories, including the ‘birther movement” led by opportunists like Donald Trump, who succeeded in appealing to the various racist elements in US society. Prior to the 1860 election, slavery was the primary source of the political divisions between the people of the northern states and southern states.  Ironically and perhaps coincidentally race and racism appears to have played a part in the challenges to Biden’s clear 2020 presidential victory (306 electoral college votes and a 7 million popular vote margin).  Trump and his various allies have focused their vote challenges and baseless ‘voter fraud allegations’ to areas (Detroit, Philadelphia, Milwaukee & Atlanta) dominated by African American voters, who turned out in record numbers. In many ways, Trump’s efforts to overturn Biden’s decisive victory is similar to how after Lincoln won the 1860 election, instead of respecting the will of the US voters, the losing pro-slavery southern states opted for secession from the Union, rather than wait for Lincoln and the US to outlaw slavery. Trump and his supporters lost a free and fair election by over 7 million votes, but because their guy and cause didn’t win, Trump and many of his supporters and enablers want to overturn the over 240 year tradition of peaceful transfers of power after a US election. They want to simply ignore the US voters and instead install Trump as president, even though he clearly lost the election, much like what occurs in autocratic regimes.  There is a fine line between expressing one’s 1st Amendment Rights and unconstitutional efforts to overturn the US election results because they weren't a preferred outcome. 


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